1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image processing apparatus and an image processing method.
2. Description of the Related Art
There is a method to perform image processing separately to a character part and to a photograph part of, for example, edited image data or image data obtained by optical scanning.
The United States Patent Application No. 2009/002739 discloses the following method: continuous tone data and binary data are separately encoded by a computer; the encoded data is transferred to an inkjet printer; the data is decoded in the inkjet printer; the continuous tone data undergoes a halftoning process to become binary color data in the inkjet printer; and the binary data and the binary color data are composed into printing data and then used for printing.
Photographic image data and character image data are examples of the edited image data or the image data obtained by optical scanning. Ink color conversion to the continuous tone data of the character image data is not performed. In the method disclosed in the United States Patent Application No. 2009/002739, however, an ink amount to be applied to a recording medium is not appropriate depending on the type of the recording medium and therefore desirable image quality of the printed material is not always obtained.
If an ink ejection amount is not considered and an ink applying amount range of a printing sheet which is a recording medium is exceeded, ink overflow or blurring may occur in the printed material. In such a case, image quality may be affected.